Articles tagged: Family and Care

A Rather Too Conservative First Year

CPD fellow Eva Cox assesses the Rudd Government’s performance on Indigenous issues, income support, child care and parental leave: Rudd has apologised to the Stolen Generation, signed Kyoto and fixed some of the worst conditions for asylum seekers. These actions seemed to suggest a serious change in political directions, but other signs show he is leading a government designed to avoid scaring off the Howard voters. This is worrying as the social agenda of the government could be defined as a more modern form of social conservativism, with some residual neo-liberal tendencies. It lacks the fire and imagination that would challenge some of the retrograde social assumptions that drove most of the last government’s policies. more

Paid Maternity Leave: Time for One Last Push

Natasha Stott Despoja on Paid Maternity Leave: After the past few months with the deliberations and report of the Productivity Commission, it looks like Paid Maternity Leave (PML) may finally happen – that is, unless the Government can think of reasons to delay further. But what took them so long and, more to the point, why did both major parties persistently kill legislation that has been on the table for over 6 years? more

WELA submission to the Productivity Commission about Paid Maternity Leave

As Chairperson for the Women’s Electoral Lobby Australia (WELA), I’ve been heavily involved in preparing a submission for the Productivity Commission’s inquiry into Paid Maternity, Paternity and Parental Leave.

The WELA strongly supports introducing industrial based, paid maternity leave as soon as possible with three clear arguments supporting this proposal:

1. Financial reasons for maintaining income in households around the time of birth rather than decreasing it by the loss of an income earner; more

Common Ground: Paid maternity leave

CPD’s flagship public event series, Common Ground, kicked off on Wednesday April 23rd in Sydney. Sharan Burrow, President of the Australian Council of Trade Unions, and Tony Steven, CEO of the Council of Small Business of Australia explored what they have in common on the topic of paid maternity leave. Common Ground was opened by David McKnight, author of ‘Beyond Right and Left’, and moderated by Marie Claire editor Jackie Frank. more

Do unions have a future?

The Howard Government justifed its industrial relations legislation by arguing that it would improve productivity and create more jobs. Given that the main focus of WorkChoices was on de-unionising Australia’s workforce, the assumption behind this argument is that unionised workforces inhibit productivity and job creation. The union movement must not let this assumption go unchallenged. There is little evidence that … more